Centives

Freakonomics contributor Justin Wolfers argues that it’s been five years since the recession began. In his report he also finds that it’ll be 2013 before America’s per capita income returns to its level in 2006.

Source: Freakonomics

One strange fact about North Korea is that the country has a chain of restaurants around the world serving traditional North Korean cuisine made and served by North Korean citizens. People aren’t sure about the motivation behind these restaurants with some suggesting that it is an important source of foreign exchange while others argue that it is a product of Kim Jong Il’s ego. Whatever the reason, Sebastian Strangio from the Atlantic magazine recently published this piece on a North Korean restaurant in Cambodia. Some highlights include:

• The restaurant was full even on a Wednesday night
• “Sweet meat” is a North Korean euphemism for dog
• The waitresses perform song sand dances every night. ABBA’s Dancing Queen is one of them
• The North Korean staff live in quarters above the restaurant and don’t seem to have much freedom to leave
• In the wake of the Middle East uprisings, North Korean workers abroad were prevented from returning home in case they spread the revolutionary ideas
• To be allowed to work at the restaurant, the worker’s entire family history is checked, going back to their grandparents.
• Only the tallest and prettiest girls are allowed to work at the restaurants
• North Korean agents are on site all the time to make sure that nobody defects. The families of the workers are held hostage by the regime

You can read more over here.

Source: The Atlantic

Mashable found that in the immediate wake of the Anthony Weiner story, congress members cut the number of tweets they sent by almost 30%. Mashable produced an infographic that includes a graph comparing the timeline of the scandal to the flow of Congressional tweets among other things. You can see it over here.

Source: Mashable

Expert Insight is a new business that aims to create a market for personal advice from experienced professionals. Experts sign up with the site, put down the rate they’ll charge for an hour of their time (a few keep this amount private), and then buyers are able to find them. If they agree to the price then they’re given the experts’ email address and set up a Skype style video conversation with them. The site is currently dominated by Chess Masters, Poker Champions, Economists and Sports Coaches. Slate’s Annie Lowrey notes that while some experts such as Nobel Laureate Gary Becker charge up to $5000 for an hour of their time, many people pay far more in tuition at universities. At least on Expert Insight they are not constrained by a course syllabus and do not have to share their time with other students. At any rate some experts can be had for as little as $100 an hour. Thus far the site has more people selling their time than those buying it. Read more of Slate’s coverage on the new service here, and you can try it out for yourself here.

Source: Expert Insight

Via: Slate

(*Minimum purchase of two required)

The Austrian government has decided to sell of two of its peaks to the highest bidder. Buyers have until 8^th July to place their bids. Read more over here.

Update: In the face of public outcry the Austrians have suspended the auction of the mountains. It could be rescheduled but under different terms that might restrict the eligible bidders to only those who are Austrian citizens.

Original Source: BBC News

Updated Source: BBC News

In this article, all the newspaper articles reporting on the grim job outlook for college graduates and the decreasing value of a college education are called into question. It’s become common to read these kinds of articles, so it’s nice to see someone with a more optimistic attitude. The stories of college graduates given in the article is especially interesting, considering they were once used to show that graduates are no longer finding good jobs so easily and now they’ve become successful in various career fields.

Source: The New Republic

Via: Economix Blog

Already ruling the skies with the ground breaking double deckered A380; Airbus has revealed that they’re not done innovating. By 2050 they want to see an aircraft made with a flexible membrane that can become transparent, giving passengers panoramic views of their surroundings as they travel to their destinations. Also included in the vision are holographic pop up displays, in-flight entertainment powered by the heat of the passengers and an ‘Interactive Zone’ where passengers can play virtual golf. Click here to read about other features such as a ‘Vitalizing Zone’ and a ‘Smart Tech’ area.

Source: Daily Mail

Slate Magazine was granted access to Rotten Tomatoes’ vast movie database and they found some interesting results about movies released since 1985. They include:

• The average actor has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 55% in his first film it then steadily drops to 50% for his fourth film and it stays there for the rest of his career
• Director’s first films are also given an average score of 55%. But instead of getting worse with time they seem to get better with experience. By the eight film a director’s rating jumps to 63% and after that it jumps again to stay between 80% and 90% from the twelfth film onwards.
• French actor Daniel Auteuil was the highest rated actor. John Ratzenberger, a voice actor frequently seen in Pixar films, is the highest rated American actor.
• Arsinée Khanjian was the best actress
• Chuck Norris and Jennifer Love Hewitt won worst actor and worst actress respectively
• Mike Leigh with a rating of 92.1% is the best director. Dennis Dugan was the worst
• Dakota Fanning was the most improved actress

The article has a lot more. Slate also has an interactive tool where you can compare the careers of any major actor or director since 1985.

Source: Slate

The Economist’s “Free Exchange” blog recently went to China and returned with a few impressions.

• The Chinese housing market seems to be doing okay. The government is overseeing a huge increase in supply but demand is also likely to significantly increase.
• A lot of Chinese labour is being absorbed by the service industry, leading to incredibly low rates of productivity. Free Exchange notes that some hotels appear to have as many staff as they do guests
• According to Free Exchange China’s short term outlook is exceedingly positive with the Chinese government having the resources to effectively manage any temporary crisis. The long term outlook is less clear with significant structural barriers in the economy and little political will to reform them.
• The Chinese government has a good reputation with the citizens and beliefs that the government would collapse in a democratic revolution in the face of an economic crisis may be misplaced.

There’s a lot of other interesting information including more details about the Chinese housing market and the status of Chinese entrepreneurship. Read the full post over here.

Source: Economist

A paper to be published by the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics has found that democratic professors are more egalitarian in their grading than Republican ones. The paper notes that:

“[T]he share of the lowest grades (F, D-, D, D+, and C-) out of the total is 6.2 percent in courses taught by Republican professors and only 4.0 percent in courses taught by Democratic professors; the share of the highest grade (A+) out the total is 8.0 percent in courses taught by Republican professors and only 3.5 percent in courses taught by Democratic professors. Both differences are highly statistically significant.”

Source: The New York Times

Via: Freakonomics Blog